Proud inventor Elon Musk is now disrupting the education system.
The father of five boys revealed in an interview on Beijing Television that he’s created a small school called Ad Astra, meaning “To the Stars.”
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It’s no Milford School, and the school isn’t based on grade levels. “I’m making all the children go through the same grade at the same time, like an assembly line,” he tells the interviewer.
“It makes more sense to cater the education to match their aptitude and abilities,” Musk says. The year-old school has 14 kids, mostly consisting of children of SpaceX employees, and will grow to 20 by September, Musk says. His five boys all attend, and classes are taught by a teacher Musk says he hired from their old school.
Another way that Ad Astra differs from whatever school you went to is how it approaches problem solving. Musk uses how an engine works as an example (those poor kids), so instead of teaching them about the tools (screws, wrenches, etc.), the school starts with an engine as a whole and let kids figure out what tools are needed to take it apart.
Musk scoffs at the school system for not doing the things he thought were necessary, so he made his own. It’s not clear how old the children are—Musk’s kids are around elementary school aged—and he says he’s not sure how long Ad Astra will continue. But right now, Musk says, all that matters is that the kids are happy.
“The kids really love going to school,” he says.
